


Most Unwanted

by MonikaFileFan



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Banter, Bonding, Break Up, Episode: s01e01 Pilot (X-Files), F/M, Feminist Themes, Flirting, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Mutual Pining, UST, baby msr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-17
Updated: 2019-08-17
Packaged: 2020-09-05 20:16:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20279182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MonikaFileFan/pseuds/MonikaFileFan
Summary: After making a life-altering decision, Scully asks Mulder if his offer to join him on a run still stands.





	Most Unwanted

**Author's Note:**

  * For [JustTooMuch](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustTooMuch/gifts).

> For Christina—JustTooMuch (whose writing I absolutely love) asked for this prompt for the Pilot. 
> 
> At the end of the episode when Mulder calls Scully to talk about the missing paperwork on Billy Miles and she's in bed asleep (with her boyfriend, Ethan Minette, next to her!) how about instead of just "talking tomorrow" she finally goes on that run with Mulder and they end up just talking about themselves and getting to know each other. Mulder or Scully, I don't care which, can accidently twist his/her ankle on the run and they go back to Mulder's apartment to take care of it. Maybe they kiss and stuff, maybe they don't. It's up to you! ;)
> 
> —I was nervous about this because I’ve never even thought about touching the Pilot ep before, and actually have rarely read anything pertaining to it because it felt so iconic to me. But honestly, I had so much fun writing it once I got going. I really hope you love it!
> 
> Thanks to my beta’s: Jeri, Annie, and Cate for your thoughts and catching all of my little mistakes😊

——

3170 WEST 53RD, APT 35

GEORGETOWN, MD

MARCH 22nd

9:34 PM

Dana Scully finally walked through the front door of her darkened apartment. She rolled out the kinks from her neck with an exhausted sigh as she hung her new tan trench coat on the coat rack. 

She spent several hours with Mulder in the basement after turning over their last remaining piece of evidence to Blevins, scrutinizing over the remaining details of the case. Mulder’s obvious concern over that fact aside, they discussed their thoughts on Billy Miles’s lie detector results while she filed away her finished case report. 

Feeling more and more confident about her assignment and role on the X Files, Dana left her new partner alone to stare at the computer screen, sifting through piles of papers on his desk. The unbidden tight-lipped smile that graced her face as he wished her a good night, with what she could only decipher as a tone of respect, was enough to leave her with a zeal for more; no matter what unorthodox cases would surely come next. 

All she wanted to do was peel out of that suit and soak up the stress-reducing lavender bath salts she bought along with a stack of new, colorful work suits at Donna Karan the day she had first shaken Fox Mulder’s hand. 

Little did Dana know, she would not be doing any de-stressing tonight. 

She walked down the hallway, steadily stripping down to nothing, her bedroom light suddenly clicking on, illuminating a yellow glow on a man’s figure lounging in her arm chair. 

“Ethan?” she gasped and covered her exposed breasts with her blouse, nearly jumping out of her skin. “What the hell? You scared me!” She shook her head, confused as to what her boyfriend was doing in her apartment after she told him she’d see him this weekend. “Well?”

Shock faded, much like the flooding of light that momentarily blinded her, and annoyance steadily rose in its place. She barely caught sight of his disheveled appearance as her eyes locked on his scowl. There was nothing more irritating than the silent treatment and Ethan was an expert at the game. The envelope had been pushed and now she was staring directly at a man that had been visibly stewing in something other than her late arrival. 

“_ Well _ , I got here after six and brought _ us _ dinner, just like I tried to mention yesterday, if only you had returned my phone call. So, I wanted to surprise you. Instead, I showed up with your favorite wine, discovering you weren't home on a weeknight, and continued to ignore my pages.”

Taken aback by his audacity, Dana visibly reeled from the implication of what he was saying, that he expected her to check in with him like she’s sixteen and he’s her fucking father. 

“Excuse me?” she seethed. “You knew I was on a case and I certainly don’t need to explain myself to you, Ethan.”

“You’ve completely ignored our relationship for weeks and are so secretive, far more than you ever were before you got this assignment. And, well, to be frank, your partner is a man, Dana.”

She scoffed and rolled her eyes as she angrily punched her arms through her bathrobe. “As is eighty eight percent of the FBI. Why don’t you tell me something I don’t know?”

“Okay.” Ethan stood, cocking his head to the side. “How ‘bout the fact that he’s a good looking man? A man that, apparently, catches a woman’s eye as easily as he does outrageous and _ spooky _ cases.”

Dana whipped her head around, fingers clutching her hip bones, huffing through flared nostrils. “You looked him up. You just couldn’t help yourself, could you?”

“You’re right. It’s _ my _ job to get the scoop, Dana, in case you’ve forgotten that I report it, too.” 

The argument would have seemed much more shocking to her if she hadn’t had to dismiss similar ones in the past. Triviality seemed to be a pattern that Ethan just couldn’t kick—and he excelled at playing the jealousy card. She would have liked to say that it was a pattern that only started with him but it would be one hell of a lie.

“Yeah, well, getting your journalism _ scoop _ from me, Ethan, isn’t going to happen.” She ground her teeth as she considered her next words carefully. “Not anymore.” 

Ethan flopped onto her neatly made bed and roughly ran a hand through his shaggy brown hair, whispering, “What’s that supposed to mean?” 

Tossing her clothes in the hamper, she turned her back to him, and hoped her tone conveyed both her ire and exhaustion, equally. “Goodnight, Ethan.” 

As she locked the bathroom door and began filling the tub, her eyes hovered over the running bath water and the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach reared. The rising frustration in her sigh was audible but she shoved it aside, like usual, resigning to at least wash away the last bit of irritant. Dana held her fingers under the water, waiting for the heat to rise as she wished that, for once, a man in her life would go out of his way to treat her as an equal and not just an ambitious woman leaping without looking. 

***

The steam billowed out around Dana as she scrubbed the Ethan-induced tension from her body under the hot water. While she pushed one man’s voice of concern from her mind, she found a familiar one entering it in its place. 

“Dana, you’re ambitious. But don’t let that strength become a hindrance,” her father had said when she turned down her career in medicine to join the FBI. 

His disappointment had not gone unnoticed. So, when her sister told her she would never know who she’d meet while walking down the FBI’s path unless she chose to take that first step, Dana’s determination to do exactly that, foreshadowed any fatherly doubt to take the leap. 

And that sentiment went for every man from her past relationships who attempted to quell her potential or dictate her future for her. 

Dana thought she had shaped a clear cut agenda in life. She thought she knew what she wanted to do in order to distinguish herself and knew what course she needed to take to accomplish that. Yet, her first case spent with the man they call “Spooky Mulder” had thrown her completely off the straight and narrow path she’d been riding for the last two years as Special Agent Dana Scully, M.D: firecracker of Quantico and teacher of Y-incisions. 

Being an intelligent, independent woman, hungry to ingest knowledge, unafraid to challenge herself or anyone else that braved going toe to toe with her, had brought attention to those who thought she could make a difference working as a G-woman rather than in the field of medicine.

Dana replayed the details of every event since she’d taken an elevator down to the basement and knew she made the right choice to follow her own professional path. Not someone else’s. 

As she turned off the water and wrung out her fast growing hair, she also knew another choice needed to be made regarding her personal path as well. After she dried her hair and mentally noted that making an appointment for a haircut was in order, she slipped into pajamas and opened her bathroom door, fully expecting to slide into bed and pass out. 

Instead, Dana saw that Ethan hadn’t left after all. He was more than comfortable lying on his side with two of her good pillows balled up under his head, facing her, slack-jawed in a deep sleep. She sighed with slumped shoulders and laid down on her side of the bed, only to stare wide-eyed at the red glow of 11:15 PM on her alarm clock. 

The calm of her surroundings was in a complete juxtaposition to the chaotic thoughts trickling through her mind. She knew she wouldn't be able to sleep tonight. Not after her fight with Ethan and certainly not after what her previously paranormally innocent ears had heard over the past two weeks. 

So, she just laid there with her hands tucked under her chin, musing as the streetlights streamed lines across her alabaster skin in the dark.

The last sixteen days had been the most exhilarating, frustrating, and confusing time of Dana Scully’s life. Not that she had much exhilaration to compare them to. 

She had plenty of confusion and frustration in med school but nothing remotely close to any mind-blowing experience she’d been hoping for. Every detail had an expected outcome with calculated results and came with parameters to indicate nothing more than normalcy. Even as a rookie agent being sent on repetitive, menial tasks like teaching students how to wield a scalpel, Dana was chomping at the bit for an opportunity to experience something that held more intrigue and mystery for her mind to unravel. 

She certainly was already experiencing that with Fox Mulder. 

She didn’t know much about this man Fox, her intelligent partner as of March 7th. There was a part of her that wasn’t sure that she ever could fully know the depths of him. Not really. Not nearly as much as she found herself wanting to. 

Yet, she found herself baring her body to him over those asinine mosquito bites almost as easily as he bared his soul about the long lost sister he was so desperate to find. 

Dana told him that she only wanted to solve the case, that she was there to find the truth, the same as him and she had no reason to lie. She spoke the truth. Just like he did to her in the dimly lit motel room. Mulder told her about his convictions with the risk of being ridiculed or shamed like she’d heard murmured around the water cooler. But, instead, she was drawn in to listen with genuine interest, absorbing more than just his words.

Dana may not have believed everything Mulder had told her that night as he poured out his past; so desperate for someone to listen. Yet, she couldn’t deny that, for some unknown, metaphysical pull that could only be explained away as out of the realm of science, she believed _in_ _him_. Wholly. And, for that reason alone, she wanted very much for him to believe in her, too.

His snide comment about “putting it in her little report” only spurred Dana on to prove that she was a worthy adversary in the battle of brilliant minds. A worthy partner. Dana Scully didn’t know how to fight a theory without providing proof. It’s what she had always done best. It was abundantly clear that she was going to need to continue providing it by way of earning his trust. And she found, as her thoughtful frown grew into a smirk, that she couldn’t wait to do just that.

She could not stop thinking about Oregon. 

Laughing in the rain with Mulder and feeling physically shaken by the look he had given to her through the glass mirror had her eager to pick his clearly complex and wholly intriguing brain. The urge to peel back the _ spooky _ layer of Fox Mulder was proving to be too much for her to push aside for even one night.

As Ethan rolled closer and began snoring away behind her, she couldn’t help but feel that the nights spent with him sleeping soundly in her bed were numbered. There was still a part of her that cared for him. She knew that she did but just caring was simply not enough anymore.

She and Mulder were polar opposites with his absurdities contesting her scientific logic. She challenged him fearlessly with unwavering rationalism and she’d be lying if she ever said she didn’t enjoy his enthusiastic ability to argue his opposition. 

In fact, it thrilled her. Fox Mulder thrilled her. 

Staring up at the ceiling, Dana gently rejected Ethan’s heavy arm from the unintentionally possessive position snaked around her waist. She wondered if she could imagine herself spending the next six days like this. The arguing, the embellishment of smiles, or the attempt to stroke a man’s ego every time she turned around was tiresome. Just the thought of spending another six months listlessly stumbling through a relationship with him made her angry. It wasn’t apart of her life’s agenda and just couldn’t picture it. 

And, of course, she knew that she never could.

Dana found herself relieved at the realization that she didn’t want simple, and she deserved more than _ not enough _. 

She deserved the thrill.

She had never allowed herself to get too close to people in general—especially when it concerned the men she dated. To truly let someone inside meant she had to open herself fully to another person and allow them access not only to her body, but to her heart as well. And Dana Scully, skeptic in life and love, hadn’t exposed her whole heart to anyone. She had loved before, yes, but not in the all-encompassing way one should when completely _ in love _. 

As she glanced over her shoulder, taking one last lingering look at the man she’d been lacklusterly dating for barely half of the past year, certainty spiked that Ethan was never the one she could expose anything more than her skin to. 

She curled back up and watched the neon numbers flick to 11:22 PM while biting back the urge to sigh. 

The phone rang and she knew exactly who it was before she even gathered the receiver in her grasp. “Hello…”

_ “Scully, it’s me. I haven’t been able to sleep.” _

The brief thought that she hadn’t been able to either since they started the case crossed her mind. 

_ “I talked to the DA’s office in Raymond Co, OR. There’s no casefile on Billy Miles. The paperwork we filed is gone. We need to talk, Scully.” _

“Y-yes…”

A groan of annoyance she had become so familiar with hearing scoffed from behind her. “What is it now?”

She cringed, smothering the phone to her face, praying Mulder hadn’t heard. It’d been exactly sixteen days she’d been Mulder’s partner, and had spoken to him over the phone twice as much as she had to her boyfriend in person. The mere fact that she had hardly thought of the man huffing next to her within that time, let alone mentioned him to Mulder, made Ethan’s presence in her bed all the more invasive. 

Feeling suffocated, she blurted out the first thought that flickered through her weary, patience drained mind; “Does that offer for a run still stand?”

There was a pause as a rush of air crackled through her earpiece.

_ “Feeling wired, Scully?” _

She hid a smile behind the mouthpiece at the mimicking of his original offer. “Something like that.”

_ “I was just going for a run myself. Meet me at Huntley Meadows Park—the parking lot. Don’t worry, it’s lit up like a football field on Friday night.” _

She hummed in agreement, and just as she moved to end the call, his voice vibrated her palm. 

_ “Oh, by the way...” _

“Yeah?”

_ “You might want to consider mosquito repellent for our romp through the woods this time.” _

She choked out a tiny laugh and her cheeks burned. “Funny.” 

She heard the reverberation of a loud grunt with what sounded like clothing brushing along the antenna and pictured him grinning with the phone cradled between his ear and shoulder. 

_ “See ya soon.” _

Dana clenched her eyes shut in the hope that Ethan had fallen back asleep as she set the phone back on the receiver before swiftly getting out of bed. Her bare feet scuffed across the floor as she searched through the dark for her sports bra, black leggings, purple t-shirt, and favorite academy sweatshirt. Even though she knew she wouldn’t be alone on this midnight run, she still made her habitual grab for her secondary weapon as well. 

“This job is going to be more than _ just a job _ to you—to _ us _, isn’t it?” Ethan’s accusatory question stoked her internal fire before he could even get to the word ‘just’. 

Dana groaned and shook her head, wanting nothing more than to mutter it under her breath as she murmured, “Yes… but you know that already.” 

“Yeah, I do, dammit! I also know that I’m suddenly losing my girlfriend to some governmental position where she gets shoved into a dangerous job for a man, let alone a woman, risking her life while running through the forest in the dark.”

Her eyes bulged and she saw red.

“That is the most misogynistic thing I’ve ever heard you say. How dare you sa—”

“Shit, you _ know _ I’m sorry,” he tossed the covers back and stood, pinching the slender bridge of his nose with a sigh, attempting to backpedal away from a confrontation he incited. “That didn’t come out the way I intended.” 

“Oh, I think that’s exactly the way you intended it.”

“Jesus!” He waved his hands dismissively, as though his half-assed apology for implying her added X chromosome was somehow less than Mulder’s Y completely absolved him of his transgression. “I said I was sorry… but I guess I should say it again.” 

Swallowing the colorful array of cuss words just waiting to burst from her mouth, she shook her head and calmly confessed, “Sorry isn’t enough this time.” 

She elected not to say more and instead finger combed her hair back into a low pony, grabbed her workout clothes, and escaped into the bathroom. The relief she felt as she shed her nightgown that reeked of the God-awful cologne he knew that she hated was liberating. The anticipation that thrummed through her veins as she slid into her leggings and well-worn sweatshirt left her feeling not the least bit guilty. 

She glided through her bedroom but stopped at the doorway with her back to him. She arched a brow and tossed out the finality she knew Ethan had been waiting to hear for weeks. “Don’t wait up for me… and please, leave your key on the table on your way out.” 

“Dana…”

“I’m sorry, Ethan—that you can’t understand my life is not about you. I truly am. And I don’t want to hurt you, but you and I both know that “_ us” _ isn’t working anymore.” 

Striding through the doorway with a confident turn of the lock, she effectively closed more doors than just the one belonging to her apartment, and _ chose _ to slip into the darkness. 

***

CEDAR TRAIL LOOP

NIGHTTIME RUNNERS TRAIL

HUNTLEY MEADOWS PARK

ALEXANDRIA , VA

12:05 AM

Northeastern Virginia’s weather in late March had never been reliable. The air could be frigid late at night with the wind casting a winter-like breeze off the Potomac River or, in this case, the swing of spring could send a blanket of humidity over the city. It really was a perfect night for a run, even with the oppressive mosquito population laying in wait. 

Dana passed a group of laughing, sweat-soaked teenagers tossing a basketball between them as they piled into the back of a pickup. Apparently, the park was the place to be on a Friday night. 

“Hey, you made it,” Mulder said with the exact look of innocent charm he gave her the last time she saw him donned in his running attire. 

“You doubted me?” A nervous pitch of her belly seeing him smile at her this way certainly made her doubt herself. 

He shrugged and adjusted the drawstring on his form fitting sweats. “Doubt? No. Intrigued you would choose to meet me out here in the middle of the night when you’d spent all day with me? Yeah.”

“Don’t read too much into it.” She didn’t want him digging any deeper into her impulsive decision tonight. 

He scanned her lower right leg and nodded to her gun tucked securely against her ankle. “You’re packin’. Don’t trust me yet, Agent Scully?” 

“It’s not you I don’t trust.”

He hummed approval. “Couldn’t sleep either, I take it?” 

She shook her head ‘no’ against her knee as she stretched. “Too keyed up.” He looked down at her quizzically as he extended his long legs out into a lunge. “Had too many things on my mind.”

“Same here. Although, I always have too many things on my mind, and I know calling you after you had already stayed late with me in the office couldn’t have helped you succumb to the sandman.” 

“It’s fine. We had work to do.” Dana rolled her neck, still feeling the tension lingering as to the real reason sleep evaded her, and gave a decisive nod. “Ready?”

Mulder tossed her a boyish grin and darted off down the lit path with a playful laugh. “Come on, Scully, lets see whatcha got.”

She pushed off into a sprint, thinking how childish this would seem if this were happening with anyone else. Somehow, Mulder seemed to know exactly how to get her to follow him. 

“You cheated,” she accused with a poke of her elbow to his ribs.

“I know,” Mulder chuckled and hopped away as she feigned another attack. “I never play by the rules, Scully,” he reminded her. “Still want to be partners with the FBI’s most unwanted?” 

“I like a good challenge.”

He grinned and stepped back into her personal running-bubble. “I sure hope so.”

Staring at the upcoming curve ahead with a bemused smile playing on her lips, Dana shoved Mulder’s shoulder, making him stumble to the left, and raced forward as she squeaked out an uncharacteristic giggle. “You sure?”

Her arms pumped furiously as she flew around the tree-lined corner. Her heart pounded hard against her chest, making her breathless; and it wasn’t from lack of endurance. The thudding of Mulder’s big feet closing in on her along the patchy trail sent a burst of laughter from her lips. She hadn’t laughed this much in months; and it felt amazing. 

“Comin’ in hot,” he announced and slowed himself with a gentle hand to her wrist. “Now who's cheating?”

They shared a flash of a grin and fell into an easy pace. As beads of sweat stippled along his chestnut hairline and across the bridge of his prominent nose reflecting in the lights above, Dana was instantly struck with the knowledge that Fox Mulder was always irritatingly handsome. 

“It’s not cheating when you grow up with a big sister and two brothers," she panted. "My competitive streak runs deep."

“Should’ve guessed. No brothers for me, though.” 

Samantha Mulder was never mentioned, but the shadow of her presence followed them over the boardwalk and through the well-lit winding path marked “Moderate Skill Level Course.”

He chuckled when she leapt over a tree branch. “You enjoyed the academy fitness test, didn’t you?” 

“Of course,” she answered triumphantly. “I ran the 1.5 mile timed run in twelve minutes and fifty seconds. First place for women in my class.”

“Not bad at all, Scully. Your competition may have assumed those little legs of yours would’ve been a hindrance. But, for some reason, I’m betting you were counting on being underestimated.” 

She arched a brow at his rather accurate assessment of her entire FBI experience. “Did you just call me little?”

“No, not at all,” he said agast, not catching her amused expression. “Your presence alone assures that _ stature _ means nothing in that regard.”

Despite his awkward, panicky attempt to save himself from a potential Scully tongue-lashing, Mulder trying to compliment her was rather endearing. 

“Meaning…?” 

“What I mean is…” he huffed as his feet danced gracefully around a pile of rocks. “Wait, I get the impression that I could get slapped if I finish my sentence....”

Dana spat out a laugh and quickly concealed it with a cough. “If it has to do with breasts, you might be walking right into that. However, you don’t strike me as the type that lives that brand of dangerous… so, keep going.”

“I know better than to go there with any woman. I was going to say, small package, big punch. It intimidates people with certain complexes… you know? Strong women instill a fear in the minds of men who can’t see potential beyond gender.”

Embarrassed at the abrupt surge of gratitude for her partner she hadn’t even realized she needed, Dana gave him an appreciative smile and asked, “What was your time?”

He shrugged, looking back down the pathway. 

“Oh, come on. My little legs can’t be that much faster,” she joked. 

“Ten minutes flat.”

Dana slowed her pace, absorbing the fact that Mulder was the current two mile record holder for the fastest time at the academy. “Planned on moonlighting for the 5,000-meter Olympic tryouts, I’m assuming.”

“Nah, I spent my free time playing basketball and searching for the obscure in dark places,” he smirked, but Dana could see just how true that statement really was with the furrow of his brow. 

They continued to jog leisurely at a steady pace in silence. Despite the natural fluidity of their linguistic body language, their verbal communication skills concerning certain things could still use some work. “About the implant…”

Mulder brushed his arm against hers in dismissal. 

“Scully, I did a lot of thinking, and I’m still not sure what to think yet. But, there’s nothing to be done now. Is what it is. We lost all our other evidence to support the claim of alien influence. This time anyway.” 

Dana blew a steady stream of air through her pursed lips in both amusement at the use of “alien,” and relief there would be no animosity held on his end. 

“But don't get too excited,” he nudged her swinging arm, “I’ve got a feeling that this is just the tip of the iceberg, Scully.” She cocked a brow at him to continue, intrigued in spite of herself. “Whoever did this, whoever stole our evidence in an attempt to hide the truth, won’t keep it hidden forever. Not with us searching for it.”

Something uncoiled in her gut at his use of “us,” and her heart jolted in her chest. It made her want to offer up something, too. 

“Mulder, I might seem rigid or argumentative, but if you—if we are looking for the truth, then it’s my job to try and prove or disprove it with science. The truth _ is _ out there, Mulder—”

“We just have to know where to look,” he finished, beaming down at her through dark lashes as their elbows touched and swayed side to side. “I remember.”

Dana hardly even noticed the sudden rush of heat flaming across her cheeks as she reluctantly tore her eyes away from his. 

Their labored breathing barely drowned out her uninvited racing thoughts of the unprofessional kind. But even within the shadows, they looked like one form merging beneath the starlight.

***

The Loop’s lighting marked a path of tandem footfalls through the dewy grass. Regardless of their opposing strides, they still managed cohesion flawlessly. 

As they rounded a corner of the second mile as one and surged forward up a grassy incline, curiosity in gathering more partnerly information urged Dana to break the peaceful silence. 

“So, Oxford, huh? How’d that happen?”

“The short version?” he asked as he breathed through a sudden cramp she could tell he was hiding. “The further from home, the better.” 

Dana nodded, fully expecting that to be part of his reasoning with the what he had confessed to her as she laid across his hotel bed. Jesus, how intimate that seemed now. _ How trusting, _she conceded. There hadn’t been a day since then that the image of his intense, hazel gaze piercing through her own hadn’t sashayed teasingly across her mind's eye. She balked at the unbidden memory each time. And, it happened more often than she’d like to admit. 

She already knew deep down that she was taking a risk working with Agent Mulder. A slight pang of fear had been prodding her mind at the reality of walking into the unknown beside him. But, it was a pleasant ache that excited more than concerned her. Maybe jumping into the deep end without knowing what lurked below was the real test. Acing it, however, depended not only on her, but on the other half of this partnership as well. 

“...and that’s how close I came to being a Harvard grad instead.”

She just missed whatever he’d said after that while musing, so she attempted to fill in her own blanks for him and sucked in a lungful of air. 

“Harvard? I nearly applied there myself. It wasn’t meant to be, though, not enough scholarship money,” she panted out between strides. “And, UMD offered more where I needed it most. So, I guess that can be considered a What Could Have Been moment as well.” 

"We could’ve passed each other on campus and never even known it."

She saw a flash of them walking alongside one another, bumping book bags, their eyes meeting through their reading glasses and—

“I would hardly have noticed,” she admitted with a scoff. “My eyes were either memorizing flashcards or trained on the future paths laid out ahead of me. I never had much time for dating…” 

The images of herself spending Friday nights in her dorm, surrounded by medical books and listening to Missy chat away about her exciting nightlife, making her jealous, only made Dana smile now at the sacrificial payoff. 

The stumble of his feet brought her attention back from her introspection, her spoken words of implication slowly soaking in like water through a sponge. 

_ Oh, God! _

“I never had time for distractions is what I meant,” she mumbled, trying desperately to cover the slip of her tongue. She hadn’t even told the man she left with the look of resigned disappointment in her bed that little detail. 

_ Her _ bed. Never theirs and never would be. Her bed, her apartment, her job, her choice, her life, she prompted herself.

The fact that anyone, especially a man she had known for less than a month could make her feel comfortable enough to offer up any personal information was an X-File in itself. 

“_ I _ would’ve noticed,” he rasped, and coughed away his obvious discomfort at her questioning stare. “You may not have noticed, but I would have.”

_ Was that a blush dusting along his tan cheeks? _This man just kept surprising her in the oddest of ways.

“So, Dana Scully wasn’t much of a _ risk taking _ kind of college girl? I find that hard to believe.”

“Oh really?” she couldn’t help but tease. “I had the impression you believed rather easily.”

“Ouch! You wound me,” he said in an exerted breath and she watched him give a slow and, rather suave, smirk as his chin tilted upward into the glow of the trails lighting.

“You’ll survive.”

“Let me guess,” he prodded daringly. “You had a rebellious streak spurred from your predictably excellent grades and demure behavior. You… well, you enjoyed the thrill of proving people wrong. You still do.” 

Her exhaling gasp wasn’t just from exertion and she could tell Mulder already knew that. 

“Don’t profile me, Mister-Oxford-educated-psychologist.” 

His hands flew up in surrender. “I’m not! Promise. Clinically profiling you would take the fun out of getting to know you firsthand. Not to mention, experiencing the scent of sweat and secrets is a rare commodity,” he chuckled while avoiding her glare. 

“Speak for yourself,” she taunted, fighting back amusement as his brows shot up his forehead. 

“Well, I’m just assuming _ possible _ rebellion, seeing as how I don’t see evidence of body art or lingering modification, that is.” 

She rolled her eyes, concealing a pull of a smile as she felt the tickle of cool steel pierced through her navel rub against the inside of her shirt. “And you won’t.” 

“What I’m trying to say is, attempting to stay on the straight and narrow—to attain someone else’s idea of perfection, can become a sense of security. Security can lead to boredom, and then dependability, which can create pressure that can feel like claustrophobia. It’s easy to become comfortable in playing it safe; but, comfort becomes stagnation,” he rushed out. “In other words, it’s good to change direction and run down the curvy and dangerous.” 

_ Who needs Harvard? _

“Is this a sales pitch?” she wondered, only slightly annoyed that he had essentially profiled her without actually profiling her. She pointed to the darkened, winding trail and added, “Because I’m already running down the curvy and dangerous with you—smelling of sweat and secrets to be exact.”

He scoffed through a lopsided smile. “Not many want to buy what I’m selling, Scully. But I gotta confess, I’m really glad you’re sticking around to see if you might want to, too.” 

A pregnant pause lingered beneath their footfalls as crickets sang loudly around them. 

Dana could not deny the pleasant tingling that shot down her spine at his admission. “Me too.”

***

They stopped for a quick drink at a fountain near the rushing waters of the Potomac and Dana could feel her partner’s eyes on her as she stretched on her toes to reach the mouth of the faucet. They then jogged steadily past croaking toads and a homeless man sleeping on a bench as Mulder pointed out the quarter mile marker. The brighter lights illuminating the parking lot shined through the treeline ahead. 

He sighed through his labored breathing and Dana watched him frown. She could practically feel him thinking. 

“I just want you to know, regardless of what you may have heard about me before you got stuck with this assignment, Scully, I’m not foolish in my endeavor to find the truth.”

“I… well, I don’t think you’re foolish at all, Mulder.” 

“Yeah?”

She wanted to say more about what she really thought of him. How his headstrong doctrine made her think twice about her own scientifically valid theories. How his amazing mind splayed out for her in a simple file intrigued her enough to think about it more than once while attending Quantico, before she had even shaken his hand. How their opposing minds mingling like magic in the Oregon rain made her feel more alive than any moment in her life beforehand. 

Instead, she settled on, “I think you’re rather brilliant, actually.”

His stride slowed and she felt his gaze heating her already burning face. 

“Brilliant enough to subscribe to the notion that us meeting in life was fate? Whether we hypothetically met at Harvard, on the D.C. streets, or were thrust together as partners two weeks ago, I believe we were meant to end up debating one another’s theories. Side by side.”

Dana felt the burn from her cheeks spread down to her neck like wildfire. “I don’t believe in fate, Agent Mulder. We make our own choices in life.”

“Which, in theory, could lead to only one result in the end, Scully. You said it yourself—each universe can only produce one possible outcome."

Dana dropped her jog down to a trot as they reached the peak of the rolling hill, brow arched at his brazenness in quoting her own paper at her. She took a deep breath before they pressed on downward together, his hip bumping hers. 

Side by side. 

“You really _ did _ memorize my Thesis.”

“Eidetic memory.” He pointed to his sweaty mop of chestnut hair flopping away along his forehead. She couldn’t seem to keep her eyes off of his sleek skin shimmering beneath the moonlight. “And like I said, I would have noticed you no matter how we met—would’ve known then what I figured out now.”

Enraptured and slightly worried as to where this conversation was headed, she breathed out, “Which is…?”

One second his eyes were locking fiercely onto hers, and the next he was gasping and stumbling over his feet, losing his balance, and colliding into her. _ Hard _. 

His shout of “Shit!” was muffled by the cotton of her sweatshirt as they careened into the nearest bush. “Ah!”

Dana laid flat on her back with rocks digging into her backside and spindles of sticks poking her head. Mulder’s much larger, much heavier frame completely covered hers from head to toe. The first thought that popped into her mind as his nose grazed hers, was how good the weight of his sweaty body felt grinding her back into the dirt. 

Her second thought slipped out as an audible one. “Ow...”

Mulder exhaled a groan in her face, wisping the scent of salty seeds up her nose and hurriedly scrambled off of her hips. She shivered at the sudden loss of heat. 

His chest was heaving, flushed and breathless as he pawed at the twigs stuck in her hair. “Jesus, I’m sorry. You okay?” 

“I’m fine.” Aside from the discomfort of a one hundred and seventy five pound man tackling her into shrubbery, she wasn’t hurt. But, judging by the wincing that came from her partner, he didn’t seem to be as lucky. “But you’re not, are you?”

He ran a hand through his mussed hair and waved her off with the other. “Just knocked the wind outta me—ah—that’s all,” he grunted and bit his lip. 

Propped up on her elbows, she rolled her eyes up at him and watched as he inched the bottom of his sweatpants over his calf, then slowly pulled down his sock with care. Dana sat up, ignoring the twinge in her back and dove into _ Doctor Mode _. His right ankle was turning a dusky pink and already inflamed. 

“Let me see,” she offered, leaning into him, and gently prodding the soft tissue.

“Ahh, dammit,” he hissed and she saw him wordlessly mouth “fuck” before pursing his plump lips.

“Doesn’t feel broken, but you shouldn’t put too much weight on it. If you can make it to the parking lot okay, we can go to your place and I’ll take a closer look.”

“No, Scully, I’m fine.”

“Your rapidly swelling ankle says otherwise.” She poked at the bulging tendon and he jerked away, proving her point. “It’s just around the corner, right? Or, I can take you to the ER if you’d rather,” she added, dismissing his puppy dog pout. 

“Please, no. The night shift nurses there get a crack out of sticking me in a dinky-sized gown that doesn’t tie in the back, if you get my drift.”

Dana bit back a rising grin as that striking image flashed before her. “Nice pun.”

“I appreciate the gesture, really. It’s just that I could…” His eyes darted around their surroundings, only reaffirming the fact that they were alone in the middle of the night with their legs still practically twisted around one another under the vivid trail lights. 

“Unless, you have… someone at home you could call?” For some reason, which she could not seem to pinpoint, asking Mulder that question as she hovered her face over his, made her stomach tumble. 

If it were her injured tonight, she might have called Ethan, her… well, her _ friend _ to pick her up. Although, she knew that it was not what she would want at all. This partnership with Fox Mulder had only confirmed the lingering thought she’d been aching to say aloud for months in the back of her mind: that she and Ethan Minette were never going to work. 

Mulder was right. Indifference created claustrophobia and Dana hated feeling smothered. 

Mulder had confirmed so much more than just that for her in the short amount of time she’d worked with him. And oddly enough, him boldly invading her personal space hadn’t made her feel smothered at all. It made her feel _ seen _. 

“You sure you’re okay?” Mulder brushed back a strand of sweaty hair that was plastered to her forehead. And for a moment, as his concerned gaze of green and gold swirled into hers, she honestly wasn’t sure. “And no, Scully, unfortunately for you, you’re the only _ someone _ I’ve got.”

“Fine,” she confirmed, ignoring her renewed galloping heart. “Your place it is.” 

She bent her head so that their foreheads nearly touched. As she slid a supportive arm around his back, she brushed off the dirt caked to her palm and reached for his other hand. His agile fingers curled around hers as she hoisted him up onto his left foot. Mulder’s warm, damp chest bumped against her cheek, wafting the distinct scent of sandalwood and tangy perspiration deep into her lungs. 

And, just like that, the name Ethan couldn’t have been further from Dana’s mind. 

***

Fifteen minutes of Mulder clutching onto Dana as if she were a cane and struggling to make it around the tail end of the loop, the duo arrived at her car where he essentially dove in the passenger seat head first with exhaustion. She could empathize. 

While driving out of the park’s entrance with him just inches away, Dana took the opportunity to muse over the silent assessments of her partner that she’d made thus far. With his outlandish theories, obsessive ideals, and boyish good looks, Mulder did not fit the standard mold of an agent employed by the very government he questioned. He looked like a mysterious man with a troubled past who would, unblinkingly, risk his life for a breadcrumb leading to any possible truth. 

Fox Mulder was forming his own mold and wholly unapologetic about it. 

As Dana’s gaze focused on the gleam of defiance of authority that she was sure masked any emotional pain shining in his eye; she dragged her assessing stare down to the confidant, upturned curve of his pout and blinked thoughtfully. He was distractingly alluring and easily blurred her crystalline focus. It only made her wonder if she might one day be capable of abandoning “standard” and risk re-molding herself as well. 

Would she even want to? 

Somehow, she found that as hard to believe as the existence of extraterrestrials. 

“...the light, Dana.”

Her eyes fluttered back into focus. “What?”

“The light’s green now,” he said with a nod at the lime neon beaming brightly into the darkened car. 

The grin growing on his dirt-streaked face made the fact that she was still blatantly staring at him incredibly awkward. Flicking her eyes away, heat bloomed beneath her skin as she stomped on the gas, muttering with embarrassment, “I knew that. And I think I prefer you calling me _ Scully _, Mulder.” 

His throaty chuckle sent a brow up to her hairline as it dawned on her that he’d probably already tried that. “That’s perfect… _ Scully _.” 

The rest of the ride would be spent ignoring Mulder’s anxious knee-bouncing and attempting to regain her composure. 

Her fingers gripped the wheel while she calculated the probability of her success in ever ignoring Mulder as highly unlikely. 

***

Five minutes later, Mulder pointed up toward a fourth floor window and chugged the last of her water she’d offered him when they first got in. “It’s right up here on the left.” 

Dana tried her damnedest to maneuver the car as close to the entrance as possible but still managed to roll a back tire up and over the curb with a jolt. Mulder grinned and she quickly cut off any smart remark by questioning his ability to get out unassisted. 

“Yeah, I’ve got it.”

He pulled himself out and managed to take several wobbly steps before he froze with a hiss. She could tell by his expression that he was biting back the pain. The tension of her embarrassment over being caught improperly gazing at her partner ebbed as she realized he was clearly over the incident and focusing on his pain. 

Dana dipped her head under his arm and wrapped her own around his slender waist. “Come on, partner, you can lean on me.”

He paused and blinked down at her. 

“You _ sure _?” 

She never knew that two simple words could carry more weight than one hundred complex ones. 

She nodded and fisted his sweatshirt tightly, tugging him impossibly close. “As sure as I’ll ever be.”

***

2630 HEGAL PLACE, APT 42

ALEXANDRIA, VA

1:52 AM

Mulder leaned against the door jam and swung open the door of apartment 42. A gust of humid air made her lashes flutter shut. 

Hobbling inside, he turned on the flickering foyer light and waved her in. His nervous chuckle and unintelligible rambling gave her pause as she hovered over the threshold. Her immediate thought was that this simple act could be misconstrued as unprofessional. Yet, the fresh memory of her rushing into his darkened hotel room, scared, and half-dressed as she exposed her panties and vulnerability to him had already crossed that strictly professional line. So, she just reached out and snaked her arm around him again with comfortable ease, feeling his abdominals flex beneath her palm as she helped navigate him around furniture and onto his living room couch.

“Excuse the mess,” he mumbled with his head down, immediately swiping at newspaper clippings and tabloid magazines labeled “The Lone Gunman” into a pile on the end table. 

The smell of leather, lingering sandalwood cologne, and stale pizza attacked her senses. Any other man Dana had spent time with would’ve gotten a disapproving look from her as she offered to help tidy up. Watching Mulder struggle to do just that for her softened her opinion as she suddenly grasped that she’d held no judgment towards him at all. 

She squinted and scanned the living room for a light switch. “It’s so dark in here.”

“Yeah, sorry. I like the darkness.” He gestured toward the metal rack crammed next to the arm of his couch. “I’m thinking about getting a fish tank, though. Might give the place a spooky glow,” he joked with a shrug. “Maybe a few fish could calm my mind late at night, take the pressure off you to join me for a midnight run.” 

“Interesting…”

“What is?”

“That you’d choose fish.” She fumbled her hands over swell of a table lamp and lit up the corner of the room in an amber glow. “They never stop moving either.”

“Ah, so I’m not the only one profiling tonight,” he noted. Mulder leaned back and gingerly let his puffy ankle rest along the tabletop. “Damn, I really could use a shower right about now.”

“So could I.” Dana looked down at her black leggings covered in dirt, sporting multiple small tears, and knew her backside was even worse. “But, I suppose washing my hands will have to do for now.” 

“I’ve got bar soap in the shower or dish soap in the kitchen,” he offered sheepishly. “Fresh outta Doctor Grade antibacterial.”

She just tossed him a playful eye roll and walked to the kitchen sink. She really wanted to take a much needed second shower or, at least, strip off her sweatshirt that was making her undershirt stick like glue to her skin, but she knew the temperature change would surely have her nipples standing at attention through her plum colored tee. The improper thoughts about her partner were unethical enough in her mind. She didn’t need to add pert nipples to the mix. 

While scrubbing her hands beneath the running water, Dana saw a coffee mug perched on the sink with the NASA decal on the side. “Exploring for answers that power our future” was the tagline written underneath. She idly wondered if that was what Mulder was intending to do as well. 

She dried her hands and found Mulder sprawled out on the couch with one arm slung over his washboard stomach, staring at her through those long, dark lashes of his. 

“I’m ready, Doc.” She sat down on the edge of the table and slid to the space between his long legs. “I just hope you’re more gentle than Nurse Ratchet in the ER,” he teased. 

“Only one way to find out.” Dana slid his pant leg up over his knee cap and started her evaluation there. “Anything hurt above the ankle?”

“Nope. Nothing besides my runner’s pride.”

She placed his long, slender leg across her upper thigh, slowly running her fingers over each thin bone, feeling for any overlooked tenderness. Her hands looked willow-like against his larger anatomy as they made their way up the strong, muscular tendons along his tibia, lingering there slightly longer than normal.

“You’re thorough,” he rasped.

Clearing her throat, her fingers abandoned their _ thorough _ appraisal and brushed across his soft body hair, gently honing in on the source of pain. 

A bead of sweat dripped down the back of her neck, and she knew damn well it was not remnants from their run. There she was, kneeling before the man she was supposed to debunk, and could only think about doing the opposite. 

“Excuse the old sock smell,” he said with a cringe, as if she’d rarely smelled worse. “Laundry day was last week.”

“I am a pathologist,” she reminded him. “But this,” she started, wrinkling her nose as she peeled the warm, damp, sweat-soaked sock off of his boney foot, “_ Is _ pretty rank.”

Mulder laughed huskily and it vibrated her hands pressed against his skin, making her nerve-endings sing. “Sorry.” 

He had a deep and soothing, entrancing timber that seemed to goad her into relinquishing her trust to him. Even when he got disappointed that a decomposed corpse of an orangutan wasn’t that of an extraterrestrial, or ranted about government conspiracies as their hotel room burned to the ground: even then she trusted him. 

Dana prayed, as the pulse within his femoral artery thudded under her forefinger, that she wouldn’t regret placing that important piece of her in his hands for safekeeping. There was no room in her life for regrets now. 

His leg bounced and he puffed out a chuckle, chilled toes slipping up under the edge of her shirt. 

“Ticklish?”

“Uh, sometimes,” he admitted, and she filed that fun fact away for future use. “So, what’s the verdict, Doc.”

“You’ll live, Mulder. Nothing a little ice and rest won’t fix.”

“My mother always told me a kiss fixes everything.”

“Hmm,” Dana feigned consideration as her fingers danced across his Achilles. “I can’t say that I’ve ever heard of that as a course of treatment before.”

When she finally glanced up, he was beaming. “It’s not a standard one, no.”

Replaying her earlier thoughts about him in the car, she made an admission of her own. “I don’t think anything regarding you is standard, Mulder. But… it seems I like that about you.”

“We’ll see.” They gazed at one another until a car horn snapped her eyes back down to her task. Mulder cleared his throat and said, “Looks like you’re stuck with me now, Scully. The skeptic and the believer; perfect opposites.”

She responded with facts rather than thought of what her words could imply for them.

“Opposites _ do _ tend to attract, Mulder.” And that reality scared her. 

Even though Mulder was just her partner in a professional sense, she felt that less than professional magnetic pull toward potential for something much deeper. Something she’d told herself she would never gravitate to in a work environment again.

“That they do,” he agreed with a dangerous spark in his eye. 

She gently squeezed his calf and ran her fingertips back down to his foot nested within the crease of her hip. “I’ll trust that we can use our opposite beliefs to resolve cases that are deemed too ‘out there’ to be solved.” 

“I don’t trust easily.”

“You don’t trust me yet, Agent Mulder?”

His eyes flicked up to meet hers at her repetition of his earlier question, pinning her there. “I think… that I was meant to trust only you, Scully,” he nearly whispered. 

Their eyes did the familiar dance they do through the window striped gleam of the streetlight and she could practically see his honestly swirling within them. She blinked away the intensity, only now fully comprehending how the Law of Polarity’s lure felt when it happened to you. 

She patted his wrist affectionately, carefully returning his foot back to lay across the table. “Like I said, ice it through the night and feel free to take some Advil for any pain. But, stay off it if you want to actually heal.”

“Thanks, Scully.”

“It’s my job,” she told him, ignoring the fact that it felt like much more than that. “I’ll pick you up Monday since you don’t have your car now. We have that mandatory budget meeting upstairs bright and early.”

He groaned. “My ankle might just be too swollen to make that trip up the elevator.”

“Well, I suppose I could swing by the hospital that seems to love you so much and borrow a wheelchair.”

“Only if you push me?” he asked, shamelessly hopeful.

“Don’t hold your breath.”

Mulder guided her up with a reassuring hand to the small of her back for an innumerable amount of time since they first met. The feeling that this could be a common trend between them left a wave of goose flesh prickling along across her skin. 

Dana swallowed back an urge to lean back into him and glanced around his disorderly apartment in avoidance, only to find her gaze being pulled back to his with ease. 

Opposites attracting. Magnetism. 

“You really believe that, don’t you? That I’m suddenly the only one you can trust with the truth. Your truth.” 

“I want to believe,” he confessed. “But the real question remains: do you?”

She tucked her chin to her chest as she considered this, but the corners of her mouth were turned up. 

When she spun to face him fully, he was standing now, leaning over her. Her eyes raked his upper body and finally settled on his bottom lip. “It’s not out of the realm of extreme possibility.”

As her breath quickened and she felt herself arching up towards his face, she noticed his lip that she’d been so focused on was now moving. “What?”

“I’ve got something for you. If you want it, that is.”

“Oh.” _ Jesus _, she had to get the hell out of there before she did something stupid. Hopefully, forgetting her personal lapse in judgment and escape to her now empty apartment. “What is it?”

He brushed by her slowly to limp across the room and dig through a junk drawer in his desk. 

“It’s something I want you to have. Ya know, just in case.”

Dana moved closer and watched as pink bloomed beneath his bronze cheeks. He reached down to grasp her hand, turning it palm up, and pressed a cool metal key to her skin. 

“In case of what?” She wasn’t sure if it was her racing heart, his constant close proximity, or her lack of sleep that was clouding her judgment, but the idea of her partner giving her his house key made her head spin. 

“Emergencies,” he said with a smirk, likely amused at the underlying tone of panic in her question. “Just in case you should need access without me.”

“Oh, okay…” She didn’t know what else to say so she just closed her fist around the object that would truly define the partnership between them. 

Trust. 

“Goodnight, Mulder,” she said as she tossed him a wave with the key and made her way to the door. 

“Night, partner.” 

He couldn’t see the full-fledged grin taking over her face with her back turned as she slipped out of the door and into the night; and she made sure to keep it that way. 

Some things were better left unseen between the FBI’s most unwanted.

——

**Author's Note:**

> I took the opportunity to focus on Scully’s thoughts as she found her footing in her world with Fox Mulder now a major part of it. Her having a strained relationship with Ethan seemed to work best for this. And the fact that she went on a date in episode five, would indicate that she was well and truly over any recent relationship she were to have had. So, breaking it off with Ethan made the most sense to me. Plus, I couldn’t resist taking on Scully’s personal thoughts on how her strong female presence would affect the men from her past. 
> 
> PS. In case you’re not familiar with the Law of Polarity’s reference I made, you’ll love this.
> 
> According to the Law of Polarity, everything is dual. So things that appear to be opposites are actually two inseparable parts of the same thing. Think of hot and cold, for example; although they’re opposites, they’re actually on the same continuum and you cannot have one without the potential for the other.❤️
> 
> Thank you for reading and for any feedback you may have left me🥰


End file.
